


Callous

by DenseHumboldt



Category: Captain Marvel (2019), Marvel Cinematic Universe
Genre: Rescue Missions, challenge
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2019-06-17
Updated: 2019-06-17
Packaged: 2020-05-13 09:41:21
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,474
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/19248613
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/DenseHumboldt/pseuds/DenseHumboldt
Summary: Carol travels across the Universe to find what she thought she had lost.





	Callous

**Author's Note:**

  * For [Ilya_Boltagon](https://archiveofourown.org/users/Ilya_Boltagon/gifts).



> Written because Elisha_Boltagon challenged me to write a fic without Yonvers.
> 
> We'll See how that goes XD
> 
> Their fic is linked below  
> [ **Planning to Fail**](https://archiveofourown.org/works/19227784) by [**Elisha_Boltagon**](https://archiveofourown.org/users/Elisha_Boltagon)  
> 

This never happened to her.

 

Okay, it rarely happened to her. And when it did she usually had a way out. The fact she did not have a way out immediately was entirely inconsequential. She only had to stay calm. Stay. Calm. Two words. Two syllables. Easy peasy lemon squeezy. Four words, nine syllables. Why was she counting syllables? Was this what a panic attack looked like? She was not having a panic attack. Panic attack, four syllables. Goddamn it.

 

She had to take stock of the situation. She knew where she was. Sort of. She was on Koonar. The jungle bit. She was in her own aircraft. It was currently upside down, but she was Carol Danvers and she could do upside down. Was that a dirty joke? No, no it wasn't Carol because it would be weird to be alone making dirty jokes while the harness of the pilot's seat slowly cut into the blood supply to your limbs. And now wasn't the time for weird.

 

Carol Danvers tried to stem the flow of irrationally giddy thoughts that were currently flooding her brain alongside the blood that was rushing that way causing small speckles to form over her vision. She had been mid-navigation to the Koonarian capitol when her ship had suddenly begun to lose power. She had tried to keep it upright by pulsing bursts of energy into it but that had not helped her failing engine. Soon she was in an uncontrolled spiral, already too low, over the jungle on the outskirts of the craggy yellow-stone citadel. Her small ship had plummeted and become completely lodged upside down in the crook of a massive tree.

 

She reached for the release mechanism on her harness and found it jammed. She tugged but the metal would not spring free. As she fought with it she heard skittering over the belly of the craft. The scampering of a dozen feet overhead. She froze and listened. The scampering stopped. She resumed tugging at her harness. She grew frustrated tendrils of energy began to radiate off her hands as she struggled against the sensation of being upside down.

 

There was an empty sucking sound like a great swallowing and the light in her hands was extinguished. Carol looked up in shock and saw a small large-eyed creature sitting on the underside of the console. It blinked its large luminous eyes at her. This was all she needed.

 

The thing scampered towards her and Carol leaned her torso back as far as she could go against the effects of gravity. This thing better not bite. She took her eyes off of it for a moment to look out the shield of the craft. She thought she saw dozens of eyes looking out at her through the glare.

 

"Gibraltar, give me some stats on Koonarian wildlife," she called out to the computer, her hands not quite able to reach the console. The dash hummed to life and the small creature made an excited chittering noise.

 

"Koonar is home to multiple species, the most invasive of which is the sterriphine lumen or glow rat." A projection of the very animal she was staring at rose out of the dash. The small creature hopped up and down at the glowing likeness.  "A small member of the Mammalia family, it consumes raw energy-"

 

Carol never heard the end of the spiel as the small rat on her dash began its hollow sucking sound again and the central system of the computer cut out before she could hear more. The small thing chittered and made a small circle as if it was very pleased with itself. If there were more out there that explained why her ship went down.

 

"Listen," Carol said attempting to get its attention. "I need to get out of here and that means using my powers and I just need you to not be a dick about it, okay?"

 

The small rat cocked its head as if it was listening. Carol ignited her hands locking them around the harness. The sucking sound began immediately and her hands extinguished.

 

"Hey!" she shouted at it hoping to scare it off. It did momentarily skitter away. Only to return with a friend. They both looked at her expectantly. "I have better things to do right now than making dinner for your girlfriend."

 

Both animals came closer to her and she instinctively shot a bolt in the opposite direction. To her relief they chased it. Carol felt her frustration grow. She was upside down and currently being watched by two googly-eyed rats. She gave out a cry, rattling the harness as hard as she could cursing against the stupid predicament.

 

With a click it released and she was falling. The rats scattered as she hit the console, hard. It bruised her ribs and knocked the wind out of her lungs. She slammed her fists hard against the console that was currently shoving its hard ridges into her ribs. She had business in Koonar, but it was suddenly becoming more trouble than it was worth. Deep down she knew it would be a disappointment. She was growing tired of constantly throwing herself against an impossible mission.

 

She pushed her body upright. The comm crackled to life in her ear. The rats crawled out of hiding. She shot them a dirty look before she began picking her way towards the back of the ship.

 

"Why is your internal register telling me you are upside down?" Talos' voice sounded like it was coming to her from the end of a long hallway.

 

"A minor set back. Have you opened talks with the Koonarian leader?" She found the hatch in the side of the wall and began ramming her shoulder against it.

 

"In a manner of speaking," Talos trailed off.

 

"Talos," Carol admonished him. Koonar was a mostly untouched planet. You couldn't just drop in on them.

 

"They aren't exactly on the grid, Carol," Talos muttered defensively.

 

"I think I know why." She murmured casting a glance at the animals that were swarming through the cracked shield. Obviously, these little furballs were holding back the technology of a whole planet. "I am going to keep moving towards the Capitol, but I will need an evac."

 

"You got it, love." The connection began to fade, but Carol caught him.

 

"Land over the city limits and bring a solar sail," she said urgently into her comm, shoving her shoulder into the door.

 

"Speaking from experience?" She could hear Talos' raised eyebrows through the comm.

 

"Don't worry about it," the hatch gave out beneath her shoulder and she had to catch herself from falling out of the craft.

 

"Worrying is my job. Now do yours." The comm disengaged. Her job. Her job was opening herself up to disappointment again.

 

It seemed every time they got close to their goal it slipped through their fingers. She had barely learned that Mar-Vell was alive when she found out she had somehow blown a hole through her jail cell and disappeared into the universe. The escape was how she knew Mar-Vell was alive. The loss of such a high-security prisoner from the prison planet of Xendari Prime had caused an intergalactic incident. It had invited down the wrath of the Kree upon the small colonized planet within the Pama Galaxy. The Kree could be quiet masters until they were angered.

 

Their deadly wrath had brought Captain Marvel to the surface of the planet. Though no one could say who the prisoner was that had invited such death from above Carol had climbed through the hole in the cell wall. She saw the bare room where she had been kept for six years. It made Carol shudder to think of it. She had known it was Mar-Vell's cell. They had allowed her small bits of paper and ink. A luxury in such barren conditions, but the Kree were gluttons for innovation. She was sure they couldn't resist prodding ideas from their genius prisoner while she rotted away in unstimulated boredom. Carol had recognized a small sketch of Goose on the corner of a page. An animal no other inhabitant of the galaxy seemed familiar with.

 

When Carol had looked around the cell she saw one thing no one on Xendari Prime had acknowledged. The hole through which Mar-Vell had escaped was on the outside. She had had help. Someone, friend or foe, had come for her. Mar-Vell was loose in the Universe and Carol was determined to find her even as her continued failure chafed against her heart. She had come to Koonar because of the rumor that they had taken a Kree prisoner.

 

Now, as she carefully shimmied onto the limb of the tree that held her ship, the unpolluted sky of Koonar above her, she was determined to find out


End file.
